Mold: A great market town under siege?

In several recent posts I have highlighted some of the challenges facing Denbigh. It is the town where I live so understandably occupies my thoughts more than other towns. I have highlighted the need for the town to reconnect with it's roots and return to the high street. Unlike many similar sized towns, Denbigh has thus far only had to deal with the effect of one of the big four supermarkets. That has been quite enough as evidenced by the depressing numbers of empty shop units currently available. Still, this piece is intended to provide optimism and I still believe passionately that the local community can once more make their high street a vibrant place should they choose to support it in the way their forebears did.

Across the border in Flintshire lies the historic market town of Mold. Despite the presence of a very large Tesco store on the outskirts of their town centre, Mold has arguably maintained it's high street better than Denbigh. Most would agree that the presence of their twice weekly street market has been a vital factor in this. The current street market in Denbigh is a mere shadow of it's predecessors of yesteryear. The market in Mold though continues to punch above it's weight and provides an important focal point for visitors to the town. The way Mold has prospered is an example of what similar sized market towns can achieve if they get the fundamental basics right.

As I write though, Mold is on the verge of another battle. Not content with one large supermarket, the local council is weighing up the prospect of sanctioning another - directly over the road from the existing one! While I admire greatly the way in which Mold has weathered the retail storm up to now, I genuinely fear for the future of their high street should Sainsbury's be granted planning permission. It's hard to see how the decision makers can possibly justify the absurdity of such a move. I could be forgiven for thinking they don't even want a high street in their town centre. Should they choose to look at the high street of just about any town in the UK which has been subjected to this retail onslaught, they will see exactly what I mean. What chance the green grocer, the butcher, the florist, the newsagent, the electrical shop, the cafes? The list just goes on and on because the supermarkets are sustained by corporate greed. They don't want a slice of the cake. They want all of the cake. Their unrivalled buying power means they often get the whole cake while town centre businesses fall over like dominos.

I hope the local council doesn't give the green light to this latest move but if they do, I can predict with near certainty the future for the high street in Mold. At present, local people who frequent the street market catch up with old friends and have a chat. The market is a social hub which sustains community. The supermarket does not do this. People park up, fill their trolley and go home. If that were not true, there would not be a vacant retail unit on the high street in Denbigh. As I write, there are seventeen at the last count. I wonder how much evidence the local council would need to acknowledge the perils of their retail strategy?

A toxic partner

My local council has today stumbled on to their latest "strategy" for Rhyl. The once popular seaside town on our coast which entertained the Beatles 50 years ago has recently been subjected to a swathe of council cuts to key services principally in the leisure sector. As the location of choice for thousands of holiday makers for many years, the promenade at Rhyl now stands as evidence for what happens when local government get involved. All the evidence today paints a picture of a local council with no understanding of the sea front at Rhyl. They certainly show no signs of understanding what made Rhyl THE place to be for so many years for so many people.

Having erected the Children's Village in the late 1980s amid a fanfare of optimism, the then council (since renamed) assured everyone that it was money well spent. Even it's location beggared belief. Originally intended to augment the now rotting SkyTower, the new Children's Village was built nearby. It achieved several notable feats. It blocked the view of the sea (which had for decades been what people came to see!). It blocked an important access point to the sea. It has toilets for which visitors have to pay and it must rank as one of the biggest wastes of money in the history of local government in this part of North Wales. It still stands as a somewhat grotesque relic of a previous administration. Defiant to the last, they continue to resist calls for it's demolition. To do so would be to admit failure and so the impasse continues as Rhyl continues to receive a fraction of the visitors it used to enjoy.

Just recently, the now renamed council has just announced the closure of the nearby Sun Centre, Nova Centre and Bowling Centre. They have today hinted strongly that the future of the Pavilion Theatre is now also under threat. The former fun fair was demolished a number of years ago and has stood vacant ever since. It has the appearance of a town which has just been abandoned. In truth, it has.

The council today assures us that the best way forward will be a new Aquatic Centre being run by a combination of private sector and the local council. In all honesty, what kind of company in the private sector would seriously contemplate entering in to a business arrangement with our local council. Their CV in business in Rhyl reads like a car crash. Let's hope they won't be needed to organise any celebrations in the local brewery..

In truth, if the existing monstrosities along the sea front were just demolished, it would be a vast improvement on the current "vista". No matter how curious and forgiving the tourist, there's a limit to how many rusting, rotting dysfunctional buildings you can view. It would also have the added bonus of having even less need for local council involvement. Based on their track record over the last quarter of a century, that might not be such a bad idea.

I know it's radical but I wonder whether they've ever considered seeking the views and opinions of the people who actually live there or the people who visit. Maybe it's time for the people to reclaim their town from the ravages of local government before they build something else. I can but hope.

In the private sector businesses are judged on their performance. Enough said.  

NHS Superstores?

The decision to recruit the former Chief Executive of Marks and Spencer to advise our NHS managers is the latest evidence of the consumerist healthcare model coming of age. I don't doubt that Stuart Rose will have plenty of suggestions for the current managers but what is he being asked to achieve? Is it just saving money or is it improving services? Or is it the political ideal which remains a combination of the two?

Either way, I'm not sure I see the merit in this latest step. Granted, our NHS is facing huge logistical challenges which are being worsened by the day. Advances in medical science and our existing obsession with evidence based medicine mean that national guidelines now exist for virtually every symptom faced by your local GP on a daily basis. The litigation culture foisted upon us from across the pond has ensured that medicine is now operating in a more defensive manner than ever before. It has no choice. A doctor not adhering rigidly to national guidelines now faces the litigious consequences if he/she doesn't. That only speaks of the current national guidelines from the medical side of the fence though.

What is being ignored by just about everybody is the numbers of patients presenting to emergency departments and GP practices for spurious reasons. Recent estimates suggest that as many as 40% of A and E presentations are inappropriate. The knock on effect on the hospital is considerable with precious man power being needlessly swallowed up. Many of those presenting to A and E complain that they have been unable to get an appointment at their local GP. They might just be right! As far as I know though, nothing is being done to follow up these people.

We can only improve our current NHS when we are aware of it's major shortcomings. If GP opening hours are not insufficient, I suggest we need to look at that. Likewise, we also need to address whether we have enough GPs on the ground. For fear of sounding overly simplistic, an effective Primary Care will exert huge relief on the currently stressed Secondary Care sector.

Stuart Rose may know a lot about the logistics of running a business but I wonder if he has an understanding of the biggest stressors currently impacting on the NHS? Far too little is being done in the way of patient education. If more people were made more aware of the simple decisions they can make to promote healthy living, much of the current overload would be reduced. For some, it may well be too late as the damage may already have been done. That is why, we desperately need to be targeting our children - and their parents.

The decision to legislate against smoking in cars with children on board sounds like the nanny state. But there is a perfectly good reason for this legislation. Stuart Rose has been brought in because he is a businessman and, to all intents and purposes, the NHS has to be run as an accountable business. With one small difference. The NHS is the only business I know of which remains free at the point of access to every man, woman and child. If we're going to continue with this promise, we need to start attaching certain conditions. Joe Public needs to understand his/her obligations in that deal - and it is a deal. While autonomy remains a key ethical principle, there has to come a point when somebody draws a line in the sand at the "free at the point of access" bit.

Recent figures highlighted the cost of treating alcohol related illness in the North East of England. That just speaks of alcohol - not tobacco, not sugar and not any of the army of drugs now on offer. That also just speaks of the North East of England which is after all just a small part of the whole. Addiction though remains a part of human culture and behaviour and the current spending on mental health and medical education is woeful.

If we all picture the NHS as a long piece of pipe, it's time to avert our gaze from the A and E department at the one end and instead focus on the people entering the pipe at the other.

Trust the polls?

Comparing the 2015 general election to 1997 is frankly absurd. In 1997, there was no other option because after 18 years of Conservative government, the public needed fresh ideas. The media had blown up the concept of sleeze in a successful bid to topple the Tories. Since then of course, we have seen that sleeze is a feature of all political parties.

Major's victory in 1992 was thinner than a rizla paper and he spent the next five years achieving very little in the way of constructive legislation. He did sort out thew economy though. It was his administration which built the foundation upon which growth was achieved under Blair and Brown. That they spent it in so profligate a manner is another debate.

It's clear that many Liberal voters have defected to Labour just as many Tory voters have defected to UKIP. Come judgement day though, these waverers will be faced with the age old conundrum. Vote for the party which best represents my political principles or vote for the next best thing which at least has a chance of outright power. Going for the latter could return us to the days of majority government. Going for the former will make coalitions the political norm.

People will therefore evaluate the performance of this coalition and compare it to the it's Labour predecessor. On that basis, I can see more UKIP waverers returning to the Tory ranks and more Labour voters returning to their Liberal roots. The 1992 prediction is therefore the more realistic of the two. Such an outcome though will give us a government with one hand tied behind it's back and I would sooner see a eurosceptic coalition instead.

This coalition has been more of a disaster for Clegg than Cameron but that is usually the price to pay for being the junior partner. The age group who will punish Clegg the most is the students for whom he broke his promise on tuition fees. Historically though, this is the age group least likely to even enter the ballot box - never mind vote. For that reason, I don't think Clegg will come off as badly as people seem to think.

Miliband has several handicaps to overcome before he can start writing acceptance speeches. Thus far his proposals have been knee jerk to situations arising such as the recent floods and the energy bills. What he desperately needs is a radical idea of his own making which will make people sit up and think. He has yet to do this and need to soon if he is to realise his dream. In addition, he also has a shadow chancellor in whom the public harbours a lingering distrust. He needs to ditch Balls for Darling at the first opportunity or risk losing his chance of power. Balls is a toxic brand for Labour and Miliband's advisors must be screaming words to that effect.

Also, should the Scots go their own way, the Labour share of the vote will be badly hurt. Miliband has been very naive in sharing a platform with Cameron and Clegg to rule out the pound for an independent Scotland. Granted, the Tories are the toxic brand in Scotland but the Tories stand to lose the least should the Scots vote Yes. As 2015 draws nearer, a slim Tory majority is looking far more likely than a repeat of 1997. For one thing, Miliband hasn't a fraction of Blair's charisma and few politicians in history have had less charisma than John Major. Added to all of this is the undeniable fact that the economy is prospering under the vice like grip of this coalition. Timing is all in politics and it seems as though Miliband is fighting a losing battle.

Localism! But which version?

To be living in Denbighshire at the moment is to witness what happens when local government is given too much power without any recognised accountability. The Labour leader today pledged to back localism at the forthcoming local elections and beyond. But what exactly does he mean by localism? You won't be surprised to learn that several versions exist.

Miliband refers to a devolution of power from central government to local government. His was the government which did this more than any other between 1997 and 2010 so I suppose he simply intends to embark on more of the same. Nothing wrong with that per se except that it isn't always easy to see who is supposed to benefit. I had been under the impression that the winners were supposed to be members of the public. Where I live, that has recently become something of an aspiration rather than a reality. Whether our council is just typical of the national picture I 'm not sure but they currently seem intent on closing as many public services as they can. But maybe that isn't a bad thing either. As services become ever more scarce, people might have to divert their dependent gaze away from their local council and towards each other.

The latter broadly fits my understanding of localism. In the town where I live, there seems to be a simmering under current of people engaging with each other in terms of business ideas, social enterprise initiatives and ventures aimed at benefiting the local community. As I write, it's hard to gauge how big this group of people is but I've seen enough to know that it is growing. As people have become successively impoverished during the growing social inequality generated by our obsession with economic growth, they have understandably become more agitated. If you leave heat under a pan of cold water for long enough, the molecules become agitated and, in time, they begin to simmer. Eventually, they will reach boiling point.

I know many people who are contending with considerable heat at the moment and I suspect this is what is driving the local initiatives to which I refer. Whatever the source, the outcome is the key. We are fast approaching a straightforward choice between globalism and localism. In most communities, the former seems to be holding the advantage principally on account of its wealth advantage. For localism to seize back the initiative, it will just take sufficient numbers of local people with enough in common to forge their own route and turn their backs on globalism.

Before the old Gods were replaced by money, we know that most people existed by swapping goods and services through various systems of barter. In a piece last year, I highlighted the Spanish community of Marinelda to illustrate where I saw communities going in the years to come. Since I wrote that piece, my view has only been strengthened. I have never known so many ordinary people so utterly disinterested in the political system. I have every sympathy with them because the current system seems to have run out of ideas. Whether that political system is at a national or local level is largely academic because they are so difficult to distinguish.

It is said that the mobile phone giant Nokia fell from grace because it was being run by too many people from the same background with the same ideas and the same view of the world. Unable to consider alternative views, they were unable to cope with the threat of Samsung when it did come. The analogies are compelling. In a recent attempt to gain some insight in to what it was that local people would most want to see return to their high street, the leading response was very revealing. The majority expressed a desire for a dedicated market day. Hardly high tech I think you'd agree so what's the big attraction. Well, I would suggest it's people. There is nothing more basic or meaningful than real human contact and the street market is part of our heritage. This is the place where people come together to trade, to chat, to eat, to discuss and most importantly, to be with their fellow man. It will be interesting to see what my town will look like ten years hence. Will it be Tesco Express, Starbucks and Waitrose or will it return to it's ancestral roots? The people will decide...

Those who live by the sword!

The fuss this morning over the decision to dispense with Kevin Pieterson has baffled me. If we allow ourselves to just stick to the facts, it's hard to see what option they had but to sack him.

The recent Ashes tour has been analysed to death but certain basic facts stick out like a sore thumb. We didn't score enough runs and we didn't take enough wickets. The Australians had one bowler with sufficient speed to make the difference. Not one English batsman showed the technique or stomach to deal with that bowler. We need to accept that fact. What we don't have to accept though is our most senior batsman refusing to adapt his technique when the chips are so obviously down. That is exactly the time when the team need such a player to knuckle down and set the example.

Many people have refered to him being an individual or a maverick and that's all very well. There comes a time though where you have to remember your obligations to your fellow team members. That applies to any sport. Let's not forget that he will now go to IPL and earn shed loads of money in the only format of the game suited to his style. If he gets out to an irresponsible shot in IPL, nobody will even notice because that is the nature of T20 cricket. Test match cricket is a different kettle of fish.

I've read people comparing his record to people like Cowdrey, Hammond and Barrington. I almost fell off my chair laughing. He's nowhere near their standard. To start with, they all played their careers on uncovered wickets with a fraction of the padding protection worn today. They also played in an era when most sides fielded two spinners so had to have a solid technique to survive. All three of these players were noted for their ability to play the ball late and to keep it on the floor. They knew the golden rule of batting - you only get one chance and you can't make runs sitting in the pavilion. That is why Tendulkar became such a cult figure in India - there might have been better batsmen than him but few prized their wicket more! Pieterson may well have played over a hundred tests but he never learned that lesson. When he did encounter a top quality bowler last winter in Australia, his lack of progress showed. Had he sought to learn from his previous cavalier approach, he ought to have scored a minimum of 500 runs down under.

I salute the selectors for their decision because aside from anything else, it sends out the correct message to the team. The team! When you go out to bat, you do so for the team. We can't afford an "I'm alright Jack" approach from anybody and least of all from a senior player. As I say, if T20 is your thing, Pieterson is tailor made. For test matches though he is the sort of luxury which costs you dearly. Had he even attempted a modicum of contrition over some of those hideous dismissals, he might have given the selectors a tough decision. As it was, he did their job for them. England can now seek to regroup as a tight unit where the whole is more important than any individual - that has been the secret of all the best sides in test cricket history.

A stroll through Denbigh

Yesterday I went to Denbigh Castle with my wife and six year old son. I had been notified of a story telling session which was taking place in the recently opened £600,000 visitor centre. I saw the notification on facebook courtesy of a very hard working local Councillor. Social media is not all bad it seems.

Being residents of Denbigh, we have permit cards which entitle us to free access to the Castle. These cards are worth their weight in gold so if you're a Denbigh resident, I would urge you to take some identification (with your address on) to the library and get your card. I remember being taken there when I was my son's age and few things in life could fire a young imagination quite like Denbigh Castle. Nothing has changed.

Yesterday was the first rain free day we've had in a while. I was expecting hoards of people to be there but was sadly disappointed. CADW laid on the event and it was absolutely brilliant. Delivered by a lady whose enthusiasm left you feeling weak, we heard stories of Owain Glyndwr and Chirk Castle. My son had the opportunity to try his hand at playing medieval musical instruments. It was tailor-made for inquiring young minds and was therefore all the more sad to see such a disappointing turn out of young people. We also had ample time to take in the breathtaking views of the town and the vale before making our slow descent down Love Lane in to the town.

We are local so know the town well. Had we been visitors to the area - and I noticed quite a few when we were at the castle - we would have wanted to wander around this ancient town perhaps in search of a cup of tea or coffee and maybe even a piece of cake. We would have been very disappointed. Making my way home, I took photographs of the current vacant premises in the town and posted them on the "Not available in Denbigh" facebook group. With over 200 members after just seven days, it seems as though there is an ever expanding nucleus of locals passionate about this great town. I shared the photographs to serve as a graphic reminder of the great possibilities for us all on our own door step. The first rule of business is to open your door and we only encountered Lynn at "Make the most of" just above Cawthrays. If half of the current vacancies were filled, it would give locals and visitors seven more reasons to use our high street. If mnore of the existing businesses opened their doors on a Sunday afternoon, I'm sure it would have an impact. Granted, it might take time but I'm sure it would be worth it for all concerned.

The suggestions for what would bring people back on to the high street continue to appear and I would urge everyone to keep them coming and spread the word. The more people engaged, the clearer the picture will be of what people actually want. That seems a good place to start. Some people have suggested that the name of the facebook group has too negative a connotation. I'm all ears. I think the group will be most relevant if the title and suggestions come from the local community - not me. I'm just somebody passionate about the town. I'm just one person. When a community gets together, anything can happen.

I am certain that the Castle can and should play a pivotal role in bringing people back. When you've visited Denbigh Castle, there's only one way to go - down. That is when the high street will benefit - if it is ready to do so. In one week, the suggestions have been excellent and I've noticed separate little groups emerging of like minded local people with a common vision for a particular business opportunity. How great is that?